


A Horrible Noise

by faultysfaux



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Book 7: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Broken Heart Syndrome, Canonical Character Death, Do not read if you aren't ready to be sad, Extreme angst, Fred Weasley/George Weasley - Freeform, Gen, I don't care which way you read it you do you, I'm Sorry, Non-Explicit, unfortunately
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-01
Updated: 2020-04-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:42:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23434114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faultysfaux/pseuds/faultysfaux
Summary: Percy brings Fred to the Great Hall, and can do nothing but watch as George's heart breaks.
Relationships: Fred Weasley & George Weasley, Fred Weasley & Weasley Family, Percy Weasley & Weasley Family
Comments: 13
Kudos: 77





	A Horrible Noise

**Author's Note:**

> It's April 1st on day of posting so you know what that means! Happy Birthday F&G. I'm very sorry but I couldn't help making myself feel sad with my own take on how how George took discovering Fred had died sooo here we are. Based on my own witnessing of grief. Please don't hate me.

Percy knew the moment his family noticed him and his stretchered burden arrive in the Great Hall. Ginny let out a strangled yelp while the others let nothing but one name slip free in gasps and moans and hollow fact.

'Fred.' 

He knew the moment George saw what he held, had bundled up with shaking numb fingers and the taste of bile at the back of his throat. He knew because his little brother's eyes instantly lined with tears. And neither of the twins had cried in front of him in over ten years. 

_How did it end up this way?_

He also didn't rush forward with the rest to meet Percy half way across the valley of the dead. His mother had an arm strangling round his shoulder in an instant while half her body collapsed towards her younger child. It was the most comforting garroting Percy could have ever imagined it to be, but he still didn't let his eyes fall from the one brother so far away on that great divide. 

'Oh my ba-a-by! No!' 

He let his wand settle and so same his burden, his father was as white as a sheet as his mother sobbed, dragging Percy half down to the floor, fingers gripping his collar unrelenting, and Ginny was so bundled into Charlie's shaking chest, her cries muffled far better than most. Hardly an eye glanced their way in such a room filled with so many equal chains of grief and shock and sorrow. 

Bill, with Fleur at his shoulder, looked like he was about to be sick, but attempting to breath through it. He was actually second to step forward, but only to detach their mother from both Percy's suit and their unmoving sibling to wrangle her into an embrace. 

'No. No. My poor boy.' 

Percy should have done that. But he was still too busy staring off to the left. 

His father at least finally seemed to animate again. 

'Oh Fred,' his eyes squeezed shut for a moment and a few tears slipped through the thick plaster dust coating half his face. Reopening they landed on Percy and before he knew what was happening he was also swept into arms warm, familiar but for their shaking, and a harsh sob unexpectedly appeared from his throat. _He had been such a fool_. He was a Weasley as much as them all; he squeezed his eyes shut tight to rid the awful, unhelpful sheen preventing his all important watch. Swallowing was hard, and not letting himself fall into his father, and let that childhood wall of security take away his responsibility was far worse. 

_God he had been a fool._

He forced his head back to its post. They were all in pairs, consoling and falling apart in grief. All but one. 

'Dad,' Percy was proud of the fact the word was recognisable at all. 

His father squeezed him, and rubbed a too kind hand across his back. 

'It's all right son. It'll be all right. It's- it's okay now...' he offered generously. 

It wasn't all right. But Percy's feeble attempts at communication were unnecessary anyway. His target of attention was moving. 

Slowly the piece navigated the currents of mortality. It never should have. Certainly not alone. The twins were meant for forever. And Percy felt astounded that he was the only one witnessing this great disaster in motion. 

George's voice didn't sound familiar in the least. It broke and scraped along the syllables as he sifted through their family. 

'Fr-Freddie?...' 

It was a horrible sound. And finally everyone else took notice. All their heads sprang up to see. 

'Oh, George dear, don't-!' his mother struck out a hand for his, but he snapped his arm away violently.

Charlie was already walking towards him, Ginny holding herself together. 

'Freddie..' It was the sort of speech that carried pain in every note. Percy thought he felt it stab at him, even as their father kept a hold of his arm; torn between his needing children. 

Charlie had a handle on George's shoulders, but the younger man was already dropping to his knees beside his other half, and it didn't look like he was going to make much head way as George lifted a shaking hand, a wet sniff bobbing him in place. 

'Fred.' The hand lowered slowly to tentatively rest on the centre of a still chest. 

Fr-Fr-Fre-ed... ' and then it was pressing down firmer. Clearly seeking what it was troubling it to find. George was visibly quaking from head to foot, and whatever control or shock that had kept him together before was clearly wearing off. His face was slightly out of Percy's view, but he could hear oppressively the wet huffs congesting him. Tears were no doubt falling free now. 

'Fr-Fr-' George gripped his brothers shirt tightly in his hand and rocked as if to move forward, but Charlie had held him back. 

'Come away George. Come o-on-' he was cut off mid consolation because George was having none of it. He jolted forward sharply and Percy couldn't help but be amazed even now as somehow Charlie's hands pulled back with nothing but George's jacket captured in his fists without a blemish to it, and the boy in question's arms having not moved from their placement at all. Charlie just looked despondent before dropping back to simply kneel in wait for what Percy suddenly realised they were all aware was coming. 

George rocked forward to lean over his twin. 

'I-It's Geor-gie,' he sounded so frightened and young. 'Freddie.' His clenched fist of fabric swapped for the other so he could move up to gently hover it over a too pale cheek and repeat his earlier contact. First feather light then desperate for a response. His first wretched restrained sob cut the air, and Percy wasn't surprised then that this _did_ bring some attention their family's way. The Weasley twins were never sad. 

'Th-huh-th-his is-nt fu-un-huh-ny,' his voice was low really, but it was all they could do to hear it as it cut through itself with harsh gasps, 'you'd n-ever do th-his to me Fred ple-huh-ease...' 

George sobbed again less restrained, and brushed his hand down his twins cheek, his fingers threading into his hair to sweep it tenderly away from his definitively shut eyes. 

Percy used to think his brothers unfeeling slobs, gits, and if he hadn't already felt petty over abandoning their family for sake of their teasing, George letting go of Fred's shirt so he could grab his hand and bring it limply up to his own cheek, in an asymmetric mirror of lost affection, he thought he was well and truly on the verge of being ill, guilt and self loathing lining his insides like lead. Their mother stood alone now weeping quietly at the desolation of her children. 

'You can't have left me. You can't. Pl-ease Freddie,' George cried lowly, his words came clear and sore, he'd stopped trying to hold back his sobs and tears. He all but dropped onto his lifeless twin then, to press his temple against the other's, letting their joined hands rest between them over a heart that would never sync again with his. 

Charlie moved forward again to place a hand on George's back. It only served in having their brother bury himself more deeply against his lost half. It was terrible and grim, and George's very breathing seemed inlaid with an agony Percy knew he had never felt and probably - hopefully - never would. 

He also suddenly felt a horrible sickening lurch of realisation, disconnection from where he very stood - he wasn't himself, and he hadn't grown up with Fred and George Weasley at all, and before him being treated to the pity of most of the hall by now lay on the floor two boys who were horrifically young, and even for their current closeness had been ripped apart for nothing. There was no reason good enough because they had always been friendly, and kind, and helpful, and done nothing but naively tried to be happy and bring childish happiness to others at a great deal of opposition. And he had been their older brother, and hated them biting back when he picked at their sensibilities, and constantly continued to try and earn his and everyone's attention at every turn. He had thought his brothers grown ups that were terribly immature... His little brothers were hardly more than teenagers that owned a business, and took care of themselves, and still tried to gain attention when it had been refused. 

_And made better choices than I did._

Now he only had three younger siblings instead of four, and coming back to himself - at a long wail when Charlie had thought he could offer more comfort - he knew just as well as everyone else, they were going to have to pry them apart. And when they finally did, that he might soon only have two younger siblings. He never knew what a broken heart had sounded like until today, and now that he had, he couldn't imagine anyone living beyond it for very long. 

'Please George, come away, he's gone now.'

'Please Freddie! You can't have left me. I can't, I can't be here without you...' 

**Author's Note:**

> For what it's worth I like to imagine Fred is alive and I have a follow up scribbled out where that actually happens after this same event. Hopefully I actually manage to edit that at some point.
> 
> Hope someone got something from this and even if this story is twelve years old do still leave a review/kudos if you feel like it - I definitely won't think you're weird. Have a nice rest of the day!


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